


lupercalia

by Murf1307



Series: 2018 V-Day Fic Blast #2: Everything Else [3]
Category: DC Extended Universe, Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Childbirth, Genesis Chamber, M/M, Post-Canon, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Trans Male Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2018-02-16
Packaged: 2019-03-19 07:43:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13699992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Murf1307/pseuds/Murf1307
Summary: A tyrant, genetics, and a man that hath the falling sickness: how Conner Kent comes to be.





	lupercalia

**Author's Note:**

> Title and summary reference Shakespeare's _Julius Caesar._ it doesn't come up in the fic, but I write DCEU Lex as epileptic.
> 
> This continues ruminations on religion, Lex's obsession with hurting Superman, and the concept of childbirth/reproduction. Some of the metaphors get a tiny bit graphic on the childbirth end.

He waits until the Lupercal.  

Certainly, that’s not necessarily the smartest move.  Every day he waits to make a move against Superman, he gives Superman the general opportunity to find and apprehend him.

But in the story that they’re telling, whether Superman knows or not, there are certain dates and moments that  _ must _ have importance.

So, he waits until the Lupercal.

The ship is still his, and he is stealthier now by necessity.  He slips inside, two samples in his breast pocket as he draws closer and closer to the Genesis Chamber.  Memories from the last time he was here dance across his mind’s eye; it is darker now, more drear, but he can still see the glitter of the gold-red liquid in that pool.

This time, none shall see until it is much too late.  He coaxes the ship to life:

_ Power: 10%.  Welcome, Alexander Luthor. _

“Hello,” he says, softly.  “It’s time to try again.”

He tips the first sample into the pool: three hairs, dark and too strong to tear into pieces.

_ Genetic material detected: Kal-El of Kryptonopolis. _

Now, the second sample, too small to see as he taps the petri dish until it’s empty:

_Genetic material detected:_ _Alexander Luthor of Metropolis._

This time, genetic material  _ made _ for reproduction will be used.  His blood was upon him once, with Zod, a year ago, but this time, he does not lay with a man as if with a woman.

No.  Now he lays with a man, in metaphor, as if _ he  _ was a woman.

He steps from the pool.  “Tell me: will this create the desecration without name?”

The computer seems to hesitate.  

_ No. _ _ Egg cell and genetic material will combine normally. _

“Then do it.”  His voice is curt, though his mind races at the thought of the future, of what will be created here and now.

If he cannot  _ kill _ Superman, then he will bear him a son — the old childbirth tragedy, told in reverse now, because the world has been turned upside down — and hurt him that way.

There is, after all, a violence in creation.

Life comes to be in explosions, in the expulsion of blood and tissue from the womb, in the millions of women who, down through the centuries, have died in childbed.

While he will not be one of them, there will be violence in this birth, in this life.

Such is the way of things, from the Big Bang to the birth of Christ, from the destruction of Krypton to the whirring wreck of this scout vessel, as it works, humming low, to do what he has asked it to.

He waits, watching.  No baptismal metaphors, this time: they were wasted, he thinks, on himself and Zod’s body, wasted on his own Messiah complex.

This time, the story is new.

This time, the religious rapture he will build does not come from any other story but their own.

The whirring stops.

And in the silence, a newborn starts to wail.


End file.
